


War of the Damned

by static_abyss



Category: Spartacus Series (TV), Spartacus: Blood and Sand, Spartacus: War of the Damned
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Canon Related, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, F/F, F/M, Gen, Non-Canonical Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-22
Updated: 2013-09-22
Packaged: 2017-12-27 07:24:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/976068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/static_abyss/pseuds/static_abyss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say that the vampires still live and the wolves yet wander. That Claudius Glaber is dead. That the Lannista and his wife are dead. That Spartacus ripped off Ilithyia's head. </p><p>Or so that’s what they say.</p>
            </blockquote>





	War of the Damned

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based on [boredomisadisease's](boredomisadisease.tumblr.com) work, which is number 22 on [this post.](http://sparty-reverse.livejournal.com/2788.html#cutid1) Thanks so much to boredomisadisease for the chance to write fic based on their work, and I hope I've done justice to your art prompt.
> 
> I owe a huge thanks to theswearingkind for all the time she's dedicated to fixing up my fic. Thanks so much to all the people who sent positive messages on tumblr and to all those who had to deal with my complaining about this thing since I started writing it.

I. 

It is said that Hades himself rose from the Underworld and laid with a Roman woman. The result of the union was a child who ate her mother's heart and ripped open her mother's womb. It is said that this child took a liking to human blood and that when Hades saw what he had fathered, the God of Death granted his offspring immortal life. What few know is that in granting his child eternal life, Hades was securing his own safety.

The God of Death feared his offspring, for the girl's strength was unparalleled in the world of the living and the dead. She fed off humans and demanded sacrifices from mortal and immortal alike. The people of Rome feared her, the way they once did her father.

Jealous, Hades called her to him and gifted her with life everlasting. The price of the gift, it goes, was the girl's strength in both worlds, and her ability to walk in daylight. Thus, the following morning, when the girl walked out into the day, she burned.

What Hades did not foresee was that the sun was on his daughter's side. She burned, but upon her death, all those who she had fed on rose again, powerful through night and day like her. On the third night, she woke with them, and when the sun rose the following morning, it welcomed her. And Hades was afraid.

The girl grew until she was a woman, fine legs and bright yellow hair to match her protector in the sky. Her eyes burned red like the fires of the Underworld, her skin pale like the moon. She was cold to the touch and so were those who rose with her.

Some say that it was her father's fault that she became who she is today. Alone by his design, a monster by choice. Though some say that she never really burned and was driven to madness during those three days she spent underground. But whatever the reason, and whoever the one responsible, the girl grew into a vicious demon, always hungry, always looking for death.

She fed on humans and watched them rise every night. And every morning, she watched them burn. The story goes that one morning, one man did not burn. His name was Claudius Glaber. Hers was Ilithyia. Together, they sought to conquer Rome.

Even now, so long after the war, Romans whisper of the terrors the two unleashed on Rome. They speak of the Lannista, Quintus, and his wife, Lucretia, the keepers of domesticated beasts. Romans whisper the name of Spartacus, the dog who dared bite his master's hand.

It is said that long before the War of the Damned, before even the birth of Ilithyia, Hades had a lieutenant. She was the priestess of the Underworld, gifted with visions when the moon was full, a silent warrior. When Hades fathered his child and saw that he could not kill her, he sent his lieutenant to the world of the living.

But Hades's warrior had never set foot on this world, and so the pull of the moon proved to be too much. She was half wolf, half demigod, in a world of humans. The smell of their flesh and the singing of their blood overpowered her. She hunted them down. Those she didn't feed on, she ripped apart. And when the light of the rising sun brought the warrior back, she was not alone. With her were the beginnings of an army.

Some Romans say that Spartacus was one of the wolves present on the warrior's awakening. If he was, only the warrior knew, and she never told. It is said that when the warrior saw the number of humans she had slaughtered, she stepped down as lieutenant of the Underworld. She took Sura as her name and refused to fight again. No matter what might happen, she would never again raise her hand against the humans of this world.

She taught herself and her half-formed army to control their transformations. But most important of all, she taught them never to harm the souls of the living. Then she scattered her army all over the world, that they might live and die far from those they could hurt. That, some say, was the cause of her death. For when Claudius Glaber marched the Romans into Thrace, Sura had pups by her side, not warriors. She was captured and paraded through all the Republic, her pups chained and shipped off to Capua.

Some say Sura died on her knees in the sands of the Capua arena. Others say Claudius Glaber had her killed before she even reached the Republic. Some still whisper, in hidden corners all over Rome, that Sura yet lives, that some of her pups escaped after the war. They say that there are still wolves who howl for the blood of vampires, because deep down some part of them is still trying to do what Hades commanded. They say that the vampires still live and the wolves yet wander. That Claudius Glaber is dead. That the Lannista and his wife are dead. That Spartacus ripped off Ilithyia's head.

Or so they say.

 

II. 

Lucretia is human and that makes her fragile, makes her tremble when the howling gets too loud the closer they get to the full moon. She knows that Quintus will not let any harm come to her, but she is a new bride, in a new home, and there are beasts surrounding her. She sees them, wild hair, and even wilder eyes, demented things that snarl when any of the servants get too close. Quintus sends boys to take care of his animals, though she has seen them rutting against the wooden poles that hold up the house, and boy or girl makes no difference to animals. She would rather never see them, but Quintus likes to watch the games, and as his wife, Lucretia is expected to go.

That is where she meets Ilithyia.

There are rumors circulating Rome about Glaber and his wife. She is beautiful, with pale skin and ice blue eyes that sometimes shine red when the sun hits them just right. When Lucretia sits next to Ilithyia at the opening games of the Capua arena, she can tell there is something off by the smell. It's a faint hint of ice and death underneath the perfume Ilithyia wears, like the beginnings of decay on a body.

Lucretia does not watch the games. She knows what happens when two wolves are set together on the sands. There is no need for weapons when claws and teeth suffice, but the animals have them anyway. They tear at each other's skin, deep gashes that would have a man bleeding out, but these are not men, and never were. The only game that interests Lucretia is the one she is playing even now, the careful climb to the top of favor by way of gentle words and flattery. Whatever Ilithyia and her husband may be, they are still the fastest way that Lucretia and Quintus can get ahead.

-

Ilithyia likes blood, the scent of two beasts in the middle of battle, the sounds of their hearts when they tear through each other. She feels it vibrating through her chest like the marching of soldiers across an empty plain. She goes to the games in Capua because the beasts are wilder there, bodies longer and larger, blood almost etched into the very walls themselves. She thrives in the villa. Under Lucretia's home, she grows a taste for the beasts.

They are the most interesting things Ilithyia has seen in a long time. She remembers too, how they are supposed to destroy her, how her father wished for her death by the hands of his lieutenant. The girl is dead, by Glaber's own hands, and Ilythia would see all the animals in Quintus's ludus to the same fate given half the chance. But sport is sport, and Ilithyia likes to be entertained. 

The woman, Lucretia, provides entertainment in her own way. It's not the servants that interest Ilithyia, nor is it the wine that does nothing for her. The place smells of cheap perfume, and the colors offend her. But Lucretia. Lucretia is an excellent toy for Ilithyia to play with, because Lucretia thinks she can flatter her way to greatness, and Ilithyia has never liked to be used.

"Do you want children?" Ilithyia asks her one day.

The two of them are sitting and watching the animals practice below them, growls and shouts echoing upwards.

"I do," Lucretia answers. "Though the gods have not yet seen cause to give such a blessing."

Of all the animals in Quintus's ludus, there is one that is yet undefeated. The crowd calls him the Undefeated Gaul. The beast is shorter than some of the others, but wider around the shoulders. His hips are strong, good for fucking, though Ilithyia's tastes have never run that way. She is undead, probably, a monster, yes, but she would not stoop so low as to fuck an animal. Lucretia, however, may be persuaded.

"They say that the blood of a beast," Ilithyia whispers, her eyes focused on the Gaul below, "is stronger than that of a mortal man."

Lucretia looks her way, but Ilithyia does not turn. She can hear the erratic pounding of Lucretia's heart, and she closes her eyes. It doesn't take much imagination, after so many bodies, to picture what it would be like if Ilithyia just took Lucretia right now. If Ilithyia were to wrap her arms around Lucretia and drink her, get two fingers inside of her because blood always tastes better if there is fucking.

"Of course, I wouldn't know," Ilithyia muses, pursing her lips and rolling her eyes. "My kind don't lay with brutes. But you, dear, you could since you _are_ desperate."

Lucretia's eyes shift to the mess below, her eyes trailing over the form of the Gaul. Ilithyia smiles, fingers her cup of wine, but does not drink.

"I do not know," Lucretia begins, and Ilithyia soaks in the pounding of Lucretia's heart.

"Take the Gaul," she whispers. "He will be enough."

"My husband."

"Need never know."

"Have you?"

Ilithyia moves closer until she can feel the pump of Lucretia's blood under her hands. She lets her eyes trail down Lucretia's neck, past the jumping pulse and in between her breasts. Blood is always warmer when it comes from the breasts, though Ilithyia has yet to learn why.

"Sometimes," she says, looking up into Lucretia's eyes. "Women need that which a husband is too occupied to provide."

"And the Gaul?"

"Will provide it."

-

The first time Lucretia calls the Gaul to her bed, she has him washed twice, and she never looks at him. He fucks her on all fours, deep, hard thrusts of his cock pushing her to pleasure she had not realized was possible. Afterwards, she sends him away and lies on her pillows feeling dirty. She thinks she does not imagine Ilithyia's laughter ringing from down the hall.

-

Of course Ilithyia asks to fuck the Gaul. She hears the way Lucretia's cries have gone from muffled to demanding, how she is no longer afraid to scream out her pleasure when the Gaul fucks her. Ilithyia knows what it would do to Lucretia if Ilithyia were to fuck Lucretia's Gaul and like it.

Ilithyia likes drinking blood in the middle of fucking, but anger is just as potent, if not more. She can drown in the thickness of anger, the way it weighs heavy on her tongue at the first drink. Hatred intoxicates like nothing Ilithyia has ever tasted. She will have Lucretia hate her before they fuck, and then, Ilithyia will kill her.

-

Lucretia gives her the Thracian.

-

It amuses Ilithyia, once the anger has passed, how well Lucretia has manipulated her. She almost wishes there was another way, but she is Hades's daughter, and no human shall ever take her for a fool. When the animals rebel, Ilithyia looks into Lucretia's eyes and gives the command.

"Seal the fucking doors."

It isn't until later, when Claudius is fighting with Crassus in the last war, that Ilithyia realizes her mistake.

"I should have killed you myself," she tells Lucretia.

Lucretia stands before her, sword in hand, and eyes flashing red with the sun. She smells like ice and the beginnings of decay, cold and broken. Ilithyia thinks of home, how dark it had been where her father had taken her. She has never had a proper home since Hades failed to kill her, but Lucretia reminds her of it, of hatred and revenge, of all the things Ilithyia has embraced.

"Who was it?" she asks. "Was it Claudius?"

Lucretia's eyes are wide with the hunger of the newborns. She eyes the side of Ilithyia's neck and swallows, her breathing a little more ragged.

"Yes," Lucretia whispers. "It was Claudius."

"Fuck him," Ilithyia snarls. "I hope the fucking Thracian rips his head off."

"It is a pity that you will not be there to see it," Lucretia says.

Ilithyia smirks.

"Fuck you too," she says even as Lucretia's sword cuts through her neck.

-

Lucretia stands before Ilithyia's corpse as the day ends. The hunger she has felt since she woke up as one of the undead is still with her. It claws at her insides, snarls when it sees the blood spreading out across the sands of the ludus. Lucretia pushes it away. She will not taint herself further.

She is staring at the setting sun when she hears the sound of knitting bones. She does not move. She is tired of revenge and blood. All Lucretia wishes now is to sleep besides her husband, and that is the one thing she cannot have. What does it matter now what Ilithyia does to her.

"They told me we could die," Lucretia says, turning around to look at Ilithyia.

Ilithyia stands, the fabric of her dress rustling. She comes close, until Lucretia can smell the coppery scent of blood that almost masks the scent of vampire. Ilithyia's breath is cold as she whispers into Lucretia's ear.

"They lied," she breathes.

 

III. 

Spartacus grows up in open spaces, the smell of home etched deep into the walls that surround him, branded into his skin. His pack is home, but Sura is his center, his control. She fills all the spaces where he is empty, and for a long time, there is peace.

The Romans take everything away from him, and yet, Spartacus is unable to raise hand against them. Sura screams when she dies, by the vampire's sword, but she makes them promise that they will not hurt the humans. Spartacus keeps his promise, lets himself be captured and tossed into the sands of the Capua arena. He lets the wolves that smell of sweat, and blood, and death, circle him. He lets them cut him, tear into his sides even as he heals.

He would have died on his knees if he had not seen the vampire and his wife on the stands. Glaber smiles and Spartacus feels rage overwhelm him. He stands, his back to the three wolves, as he kicks away the wooden sword before him. The crowd screams for blood, so Spartacus gives it to them.

He tears into the first wolf with his teeth, claws extending even as Spartacus tackles the wolf to the ground. He must have a name, this unknown brother, but Spartacus does not ask it. He understands that, in the arena, any man would kill his brother.

The first wolf dies when Spartacus breaks his neck. The second from a wooden sword.

"Enough," a voice commands from the stands.

But it will never be enough, not now. Not until Glaber is dead.

The third wolf dies because Spartacus declares it so. Glaber is enraged, but Spartacus does not care. He welcomes whatever these Romans will throw at him, those who declare him beast, but who sit among monsters. He has no respect for the Republic, and Sura is dead. There is nothing for him but revenge, and the hope that some of his Thracian brothers still survive.

"I will buy him," a Roman calls out. "I will buy him from you and train him to be the best these sands have seen."

Spartacus is sold and put into a ludus with other wolves. They smell of pack, of home and safety, but Spartacus does not belong. Not yet. He trains, puts up with taunts from the Gaul and the one they call the Beast of Carthage. He makes a friend, Varro, an enslaved Roman who smells of children and a wife.

The Roman masters have Spartacus kill Varro on a full moon, with teeth and claws instead of weapons. Varro dies with wide trusting eyes and there is nothing Spartacus can do. It is the first time he has killed a human.

That is the beginning of it all.

-

He is not a slave. That much he never forgets, but there are others in the ludus who are. There is the boy Pietros who knows nothing but the slavery he was born into, the boy who does not really understand what freedom is. There is the girl who is sent to please him, Mira, who doesn't know that true pleasure comes only when there is love. They do not understand, these slaves, that there are other things out there, that they do not have to be chained.

Spartacus aches for the forests, for open spaces, and for the smell of home. He has not been in the ludus long enough to forget. He has not fought enough matches to value the crowd's roar. At night, he dreams of Sura's warmth, her laughter.

When his dreams are replaced by blood and sand, Spartacus knows he must act. There are new wolves, two pups from Germania along with them, and they are Spartacus's way out. The German pups still smell like freedom, and they say yes when Spartacus tells them his plan. Convincing the others proves harder. Blood and sand are all these men know, masters and chains. They have forgotten what it is to be free, but Spartacus is patient, and he will show them.

He talks to Barca first, because Barca counts coin with desire for freedom. Spartacus tells him about rebellion, how a few of them could rip apart countless of humans.

"We must not harm the humans," Barca interrupts.

"Why?"

Barca shrugs. "It is the way things are and what we were taught."

Spartacus looks down at his wooden sword, at his hand holding on to the hilt. He has spilled human blood though he promised not to. He has served Roman masters though he is not a slave. He yearns for freedom where there is none to be found.

"Things can change," he says.

"They rarely do."

"What if you could go home?" Spartacus asks. "What would you do to be there again, to smell where you grew up?"

"Carthage burned," Barca replies. "All home smells like to me is ashes and smoking flesh."

"That is not true," Spartacus answers just as Pietros comes out to stand by Oenomaus.

"Do not speak to him about your foolish plan."

"He will come," Spartacus says. "And so will you."

Barca says nothing for a moment, his eyes trained on Pietros. Spartacus has not spoken to the boy about this, but he knows Pietros will come, just as all the slaves will come. Freedom, once within reach, is addictive. All of them will come, and together, they will see an end to Rome.

"I will come," Barca says at last. "And may the gods help you if he dies."

"He will die," Spartacus says. "But he will die free."

-

They are ten thousand strong before the last battle, but Spartacus has grown much in the years since the first of them escaped from Batiatus's ludus. He has lieutenants of his own now, and a name that has reached all the corners of the Republic. Romans quake in his presence, and free men and women follow him wherever he leads. They are his legacy, wolf and human, free from Rome. He does not want them to die.

"Take those who wish to go over the mountains," he tells Barca.

Barca nods, and Spartacus knows he has picked the right man. They have lost many in the years they have been fighting, and they will lose more by morning. Barca understands what it means to be given this task, what it means to their cause that some of them survive.

"The rest of us will stay to give you time," Spartacus goes on. "See that you make good use of it."

They part as the sun sets that night under the light of the full moon.

"They should have called you Barca of Few Words," Crixus says, and there is fondness is his words, though he does not smile. He has not done so since Naevia's death.

Barca smiles and says nothing. They have said it all, Spartacus thinks. Now, there is nothing left to do, but act.

-

The full moon sings in Spartacus's veins, flesh ripping and bones realigning until he is no longer human. They are wolves and humans fighting an army of vampires and Romans. The smell of death hangs heavy in the air, and Spartacus will have more of it before the night is done. He wants Glaber, though he is not foolish enough to demand that the others leave him for Spartacus. War is war, and it does not matter who kills Glaber so long as he dies, though Spartacus hopes he will be the one to find the vampire.

He does find Glaber, sword first. The sounds of battle dim in Spartacus's ear as he pulls the sword from his side. It is made of silver and Spartacus laughs as he throws it at Glaber's feet.

"They lied to you," Spartacus says. "Silver cannot hurt me."

"Then I will rip you to shreds myself like I did your precious bitch."

Spartacus had thought that the anger he felt after Sura's death had long passed. He thought himself tired, but he finds that the ashes still burn.

-

He dies at the peak of a mountain between friends, Glaber's blood still fresh on his hands. The Romans never find his body, and for that, the wolves are forever thankful. He dies their leader, though those present will tell it differently. Spartacus was a god among humans and beasts. He never died.

They will tell the story of his escape, of how he tore down Roman after Roman before the moon took him. No one will question the stories, though Barca will laugh when Agron tells him.

Those alive when Rome falls will chant Spartacus's name. "A god among us," they will cry, and they will believe.

 

IV. 

It is said that vampire and wolf still roam the Earth, that a day will come when both sides are strong again. It is said that even as times change and Hades is forgotten, the God of Death still waits. He plans in silence, in the depth of the Underworld, his lieutenant back at his side. His army grows as he waits for the second war.

But Ilithyia's army grows as well.

The day will come, some say, when father and daughter will meet in battle, and one will die. Though who will win, and what will happen after, no one can say. All that is left now are stories, and all that is left to do is wait.

The day will come.


End file.
